In Pakistan we trust?

May 4, 2009 by Elan Journo

Sixty miles. That’s how close the insurgent Taliban/Al Qaeda forces have come to the capital city of Pakistan, Islamabad. The gains of these Islamist fighters — along with the broader strife along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border — prompts the question: could jihadists get hold of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons? Perhaps so.

To me one of the most worrisome indicators is the idea that we can trust the Pakistani regime to lockdown its nuclear arsenal (or trust it to do anything else it promises). Monday’s NYT indicates the official line from Washington — and some of the facts that belie it.

In public, the administration has only hinted at those concerns, repeating the formulation that the Bush administration used: that it has faith in the Pakistani Army.

“I’m confident that we can make sure that Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal is secure,” Mr. Obama said Wednesday, “primarily, initially, because the Pakistani Army, I think, recognizes the hazards of those weapons falling into the wrong hands.” He added: “We’ve got strong military-to-military consultation and cooperation.”

Yet (as the Times reports) one of the U.S.-Pakistani programs to safeguard the nuclear infrastructure appears to have been a staggering boondoggle — as if more evidence were needed to judge the nature of this regime.

How about the history of its backing for the Taliban in Afghanistan and other Islamists elsewhere? How about its pathetic efforts to root out remnants of the Taliban after 2002, remnants which over time became the current insurgent force in Afghanistan? How about its utter capitulation to Islamists in the notorious peace deal in Swat valley? How about its longstanding refusal, some years ago, to give credence to reports that one of its nuclear scientists, A.Q. Khan, was illicitly trafficking in nuclear technology? The accusations against Khan, it turned out, were true. And that raises the question of whether the regime at the time was covering for actions that it had condoned, or perhaps encouraged.

Obama has said that he won’t give Pakistan a blank check, yet there’s been no real Change in our approach to the regime. The Bush administration — often and wrongly seen as taking moral judgment seriously — made a mockery of our foreign policy by behaving as if Pakistan was our loyal ally. The current approach likewise shunts to the sidelines the need for stringent moral assessment of other nations; witness (to take just two notable examples) the outreach to Iran and the beginnings of an overture to a Pakistani politician, Nawaz Sharif, who’s noted for his contacts with and sway over Islamists (some Islamists factions are members of his party).